Ben Bishop allowed 2 goals on 34 shots and stopped 2 of 3 in the penalty shot session for the shootout victory. He made a handful of critical saves to keep the Lightning in the same area code, which ultimately made tonight's thievery possible.

So, yeah, that happened, and I can't stop laughing. The Lightning turned in one of their sloppiest efforts of the season and looked to be dead sunk with under 3 minutes to play down 2-0. They had been outworked half the game. They had been turning over pucks left and right. People were demanding I crucify people in the game write-up. Tar was being boiled and feathers were being plucked, bagged, and brought to the ready. Then Kyle Okposo, bless him, decided to hand a puck to Val Filppula in a prime scoring area to make the game 2-1 with under 3 minutes left, a ridiculous goalmouth scrum with the extra attacker led to the tying goal with under 4 seconds left, and Filppula and Kucherov finished off two nasty dekes in the shootout to steal the points. STEAL THE POINTS! I expected the Nassau County Sherrif's Department to show up at the Lightning bench after Bishop made the last save on Tavares to put the entire Lightning squad in irons and make the team do the collective perp walk all the way to the paddy wagon. Thievery. On nights like this, whoever on Long Island made that deal with the devil to get those 4 Cups has to be wondering was it really worth it to now have to watch an eternity of... this.

4 games into the 4th 10 game segment of the season, the Lightning somehow managed to get halfway to the minimum segment goal of 12 points. If they can pull out another win Thursday against Nashville, they'll be in really good position to meet (and probably exceed) their target for this stretch with Carolina and Florida coming up after that. Heck, after tonight, how can they lose? I'm still laughing at the result.

Radko Gudas was +1 with 2 penalty minutes, 5 shots, 5 hits, and 1 blocked shot in 23:07. Uncredited was a point shot rom Gudas that deflected off the post in the First Period. His hip check on Kyle Okposo, run to the end board with John Tavares, and otherwise snarly game was a page straight out of Dale Carnegie's classic, "How to Win Friends and Influence People," or Radko's own soon-to-be-published masterwork (I know because I'm ghost writing it), "Radko Gudas' Big Book of Making Friends and Influencing People". With Hedman out, Gudas has been matching up against the opposition's best players, and he's been hitting them and harming them on a nightly basis. At this point, I wonder if they might be just as happy to see Hedman possibly coming back Thursday as we are, if only to get a reprieve from the Wrath of Radko (which, coincidentally, is the working title of the film adaptation of "Radko Gudas' Big Book of Making Friends and Influencing People", for which I'm also getting credit as an Executive Producer).

Mark Barberio had 1 shot and 1 blocked shot in 10:55. You know a guy has had a really good game (and I mean that with the most burning sarcasm possible) when people submit requests for me to light the guy on fire verbally... in the Second Period. He was a turnover machine tonight (he wasn't the only one), and he also got caught at least once on a play that led directly to Ben Bishop having to fend off a breakaway. It continues to puzzle me how Barberio's +/- isn't the exact opposite of what it currently is. Is it clean living? Is he secretly Irish? Who knows, but his d-play is almost as big an eyesore as that dump of an arena the Lightning had to play in tonight.

Tyler Johnson had 2 penalty minutes, 5 shots, 2 hits, and he was 44% on draws.

J.T. Brown had a helper and was +1 with 2 shots in 17:37. He got increased IT tonight and was in the middle of the glorious netmouth scrum that led to the tying goal. Points are starting to flow a little.

Matt Taormina was -1 with 1 shot and 1 blocked shot in 12:23. Taormina has one virtue (and only one) on defense: if you come down on him on the rush and try to make a move around him he will hit you and put you on your back (there's your carrot, get ready for the stick). Beyond that, he has next to no redeeming qualities that I can detect in his own third of the ice. He turns the puck over with the same magnanimous generosity as Barberio, which is why I'd expect to see him headed back to Syracuse if Hedman is healthy enough to go on Thursday against Nash-Vegas.

Nikita Kucherov was +1 with 1 shot and 1 hit in 19:32. His move in the shootout, eventually slipping the puck 5-hole on Nabokov, whether you call it a Datsyuk or a Forsberg... filthy. Nasty. Evil. Mean spirited. It's the kind of move that says to a goaltender, "You're bad. You should feel bad. You've been playing the goaltending position your entire life, and the best you could do was still look utterly weak and pathetic and now you're laying prostrate at my feet with the puck behind you and the red light on. And, partly because of that and partly because you look funny and your personality stinks, no one will ever love you." So. Not. Nice.

Andrej Sustr had 3 shots in 15:33. I tell you, if there's one guy who loves Barberio and Taormina, it has to be Sustr. He looks like Larry Robinson in his prime next to those two.

Richard Panik had 3 hits in 10:40. I long for the day he gets a batch of sticks from the manufacturers that doesn't have an awful first touch in every single blade.